How We Realized We Were in the Sandwich Generation

There's no formal introduction to the sandwich generation. Chances are, you've been in it for longer than you realize — at least if your sandwich generation story is anything like our experiences.

Anita and Zara, hosts of The Millennial Sandwich, get deeply personal in this episode (yes, there were tears!). From how they each discovered they were officially in the sandwich generation, to what it's like to lose a parent and put your grief on hold in the name of staying strong for everybody else, to the loneliness of being an only child in the sandwich...they go there.

It's a deeply relatable conversation about an experience many of us are having, but few people dare to discuss.

Chapters

00:00
Introduction to the Sandwich Generation

01:48
Personal Experiences in the Sandwich Generation

04:53
The Emotional Toll of Caregiving

07:58
The Importance of Support Systems

11:18
Navigating Guilt and Expectations

14:43
The Unique Challenges of Being an Only Child

17:47
Cultural Perspectives on Family Dynamics

20:45
The Impact of Grief on Caregiving

24:02
Representation of the Sandwich Generation in Pop Culture

30:07
Millennial Child/Boomer Parent Relationships

Topics covered:
sandwich generation, caregiving, family dynamics, emotional support, cultural differences, grief, resilience, millennial parents

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:03

Welcome to the Millennial Sandwich, a space for real conversations about millennials in the middle. Not just of our own minds, but also of a caregiving sandwich. I'm Dr.

SPEAKER_00 0:11

Anitha Chandra, a geriatrician and expert in Elder Care. And I'm Zara Hanowalt, a parenting journalist and expert in American motherhood. And even we don't have all the answers. Join us as we figure out life in the middle. Hi everyone. Welcome back to the Millennial Sandwich. We thought it would be fun to do a little get to know us episode. This is Zara and Anitha, and we're gonna tell you guys a little bit about our sandwich generation stories. Without getting into too much gory detail, we will tell you guys a little bit about why we started this and what our lived experience looks like. When did you realize you were in the sandwich? I don't think I put a name to it, but I think I felt it before I even had my kids, like when I was pregnant. Um, I think that I have always been someone who worries a lot about my parents, like an inordinate amount. I think you are too. But I, yeah, I remember being pregnant and just like feeling that my parents were getting older and that they needed a little bit more from me than they were able to give me, and that I was also gonna be juggling care for two kids and them, and that I had this sense of like, I need to, I need to move, I need to be closer to them. But I don't think I had the actual label of sandwich generation for myself until a friend who I I would love to have on at some point, my good friend Drita, who's also gone through a lot of sandwich generation stuff with me, she sent me a text and included the phrase, and I was like, holy shit.

SPEAKER_01 1:42

Yeah. That's what the hear it, you're like, oh, once you know, you can't go back. You just realize you've been in it for a lot longer than you realize. Exactly. What about you? Yeah, same. I think I was have definitely been in this space for longer than I've called it that. Um, for me, I didn't feel the stress of the sandwich generation until my dad died. If you're new here, I talk about this a lot. It's just part of who I am. I am a grieving daughter. And my dad was, he was not sick. He did a lot, he was independent working. And he and my mom, they live, they lived local to me. So they were really involved in the care of my kids and available to me all the time. I just like didn't realize how good I had it until he wasn't around. Yeah. I'm tearing up thinking about your dad. Yeah. My dad, he is the best. Um, he I would ask my parents to watch my kids all the time, and he would be the one to like get down on the floor and play with them and drive them places and take them out and very much like super close to my kids. And he died suddenly. And that was sort of the switch for me. I don't think I realized how much my mom relied on my dad. Not even like my mom is still a practicing physician, she's smart, she's capable. You know, when you've been with somebody for 40 years, um, it that means something. You're used to a partnership, and it was a lot harder for her to feel as comfortable watching my kids, and her anxiety, of course, got worse. It was a switch for me that really showed how much stress I felt. Because everybody tells you when you're, you know, like I I I I was very close to my dad, and when I lost my dad, everyone, instead of being like, How are you? or like how are you strong for your mom. And it's really hard to not internalize that because yeah, I get it. Of course, I want to be there for my mom. I've always been there for my parents. They always called me to answer everything or help with everything, but I didn't get the space to grieve. And then on the other hand, my kids, like I said, were really close to him. So grieving, or I guess putting my grief on hold for being strong for my mom and for my kids was really the realization moment for me. Like I'm last here, I'm not I I have to put the two ends of my sandwich first. It took me almost a year before I could even think about how I was feeling. And now, of course, we talk about sandwich generation all the time and what it means and how it starts before. I realize I have been in the sandwich for a lot longer than just after I realized it. Just like checking in with them and caring about them, not caring for them, but caring about them counts. So yeah, it's really opened my eyes to what it means to kind of be third on the list of caring. So it's parents, kids, tied for first and second place, I guess. And then eventually I'll get to myself. If that's, I mean, I don't mean to sound like a martyr. I don't think that's a that's not a good thing, but that's how it's felt in the sandwich for me.

SPEAKER_00 5:11

That's the thing about being in the sandwich generation in the middle of a sandwich, is you're just the safety net for everything. You just that's your responsibility. I mean, you have to be able to catch all the pieces for two generations, and you are the most capable. And people rely on you to varying degrees, right? Even our kids, like our seven-year-olds, don't rely on us in the same way they relied on us when they were infants, but it's still heavy responsibility. Yeah, you're still that person. Like our moms don't rely on us for hands-on care and survival and all of that stuff, but they absolutely rely on us for emotional support.

SPEAKER_01 5:48

There's so much, but like communicating and like say what you feel, and it just doesn't work that way sometimes because even if I try to set boundaries or say, I have too much on my plate, I cannot book your flight right now. I'm not thinking about your flight right now. I have like 10 other things, you know, little things that take two minutes and it spirals into this like, I don't need anything from anyone. I am independent. A proud woman. And also help me download this app when I see you next, like in the same breath. So yeah, it's it's tough when you're just doing it all, but there's no acknowledgement. I think that's the piece. That's me, like, I don't need help. I need acknowledgement. I don't, I think I can continue doing all of the things that I'm doing. And it would feel better and more manageable if there was that acknowledgement. I don't need my kids to acknowledge what I'm doing at this point. They're, you know, seven and four. But yeah, it is hard to care for someone when you don't get anything back. It all goes back to feeling seen.

SPEAKER_00 6:50

Yeah. And I think that also as millennials, we are such an expressive generation. Social media has played a role in that, right? Like we document everything and we explain everything and we give a voice to all our feelings, and we're raising our kids like that, but we're also expecting someone to give us back that expression and that recognition. And we're dealing with a generation that just really didn't put that first. That was never that important to them. I think recognition for them came in different forms, but it wasn't this like verbally expressed. I think especially for kids with immigrants.

SPEAKER_01 7:24

If I say thank you, like she's offended if I thank her for something because it's like, well, that's why would you thank me? Like I'm a stranger. Like, of course I'm gonna do X, Y, and Z for you. I'm like, I'm so confused. You and I are both so lucky that we have wonderful partners, ideal partners. And even having a partner who's who gets it, it's still so hard. So I can't imagine being in this space without that. I'm just thankful that that's not that is not adding to my sandwich stress.

SPEAKER_00 7:58

That is one thing, too, I would advise anyone who is a new parent or who's about to become a parent. Make sure your partner can take care of your kids in your absence, because in all likelihood, at some point, you will have another responsibility and you will have someone else who needs you to be there for them. And you will not be able to be 100% 24-7 there to take care of your kids. Like I, my mom broke her hip a little over a year ago, and she was in the hospital for a while, and I was there every single day. And I didn't once have to think about are my kids gonna have dinner tonight? Or do I need to remind my husband of when and where to pick them up? Or do I have to go home and pack the lunch? Because he was like, No, I know how to take care of them. Also, things like I don't need to worry that my kids are gonna get in the car sad after a day of school and face a parent who has no idea how to communicate about their emotions, right? So I think that is the only thing that will get you through the sandwich generation is having somebody else who can take care of one side of the sandwich when you are taking care of the other, because you can't be in two places at once. It's just if anyone could figure it out, it's a millennial woman, but we can't.

SPEAKER_01 9:10

So it doesn't necessarily have to be a partner if you don't, if you happen to not have a partner, someone in your village, nobody can do this alone. Even if you think you can, you cannot. And I don't even know why that would be a goal. Like that's a big thing that I think it's really hard to unlearn. Like hearing, like, I can do it all, I can do everything on my own, and I'm carrying everything. Maybe that's true, but is that is that a good thing? Personally, that is not a goal. I do not want to be handling everything on my own, and I'm not. I have so much support, and I'm not ashamed to say that. We have excellent child care. I have a wonderful partner, I have a really supportive family, and just like the resources that I have in my life, I'm super lucky and I don't want to downplay that. But yeah, having someone you trust and who is actually supporting you in a tangible way is just so important in the sandwich.

SPEAKER_00 10:11

Yeah. Yeah, because you are always gonna have to make choices if you're in the sandwich generation. You're always gonna have to figure out who needs you the most at any given time. And you just you can't care for all the pieces by yourself. It's just not possible. What's something you've learned about yourself as a sandwich generation caregiver?

SPEAKER_01 10:30

Hmm. I think it's the learning to feel the discomfort of always feeling like I could be doing more in one direction or the other and not trying to fix it. I think that's one of the biggest things that I've learned is that's not gonna go away. That feeling of guilt slash underachieving or or understanding that if I'm giving in one direction, it means I'm giving less in the other for that moment. And it's going, it's a pendulum. And sometimes the focus is on me and it's not, it's right in the middle, and sometimes it's up and sometimes it's down, and it's allowing myself to kind of care in all directions and knowing that it's never gonna feel like everything's under control and everyone gets equal attention and love and sitting in the discomfort of that, I think, has been something I've learned.

SPEAKER_00 11:22

How about you? I think I've learned that it's okay that I am not the most hustle culture girl bossy girl because I am able to show up for everyone in a different way because I have not chased every single opportunity. I used to feel like I was not good enough because I didn't have the most drive and the most, I think ambition is maybe not the best word because I think our ideas about ambition have all been wrong for a while. But I think now that I am in the sandwich generation, I'm happy that I'm okay with not being professionally productive every single second of the day because I know that I am productive in other ways. I think I've gotten a little more comfortable with that.

SPEAKER_01 12:07

I think a big thing about each of our sandwich stories is that it's a little bit different. I have I have a brother, I have a younger brother and a sister-in-law who I'm very close to both of them, and obviously my husband and I'm an eldest daughter, and I'm I'm local. My brother doesn't live local to me or my mom. I feel like if I really was like, I can't do this, I could count on my sibling. And I know you're an only. Um, how does that play into your sandwich experience?

SPEAKER_00 12:37

Oh my God. I mean, I think it like it defines it, honestly, because I didn't mind being an only child for most of my life. I was definitely, there were times in my childhood when I wished I had a sibling. I actually wished I had a twin, which is funny because now I have twins. But um, I was okay with it for most of my life. And I think in the last few years, it's really hit me how hard and how lonely it is to be an only child and how isolating it is because there aren't a lot of millennials who are also only children. There are a lot of millennials who are having one child and being one and done. And I've actually had many people reach out to me to ask what it's like to be an only child because they want to stop at one child. And I have to be really honest with them and say, if you don't want another child, that's totally you shouldn't have another child. But also, it's really lonely when you reach this part of your life and you're taking care of your parents and you're preparing to lose your parents and knowing that when you lose your parents, your entire childhood is gone, basically. There is no other record keeper of your childhood there with you at that point. So yeah, it's intense. And it's also, I have noticed there is a lot of invalidation of that experience, where anytime I see someone talking about being an only child, someone will comment and be like, Well, I have a brother and we don't talk. So having a sibling doesn't guarantee you that. Okay, but I never had a chance. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:05

Yeah. And you're doing so much. Like you're doing so much, and you're doing a really good job at it. So thank you there's no situation that is perfect. There's just so many different variables that add to our experience in the sandwich. Um I know that the definition of being in the sandwich generation means you have kids and older parents, but what if you don't want kids or trying to have children? There are some situations that don't necessarily fit the definition of being in the sandwich that still are or feel the same.

SPEAKER_00 14:44

Totally. Yeah. Or caring for a spouse, right? There are a lot of people who are taking care of a spouse and taking care of children. I'd really like to talk to someone in that phase because that's the same, it's the same load, even if it doesn't have this culturally recognizable title assigned to it. And then you probably also have parents on top of that.

SPEAKER_01 15:05

I know there's an aunt, an uncle, a sibling. Families look different. Like it can't be so binary in that whether you in the sandwich generation or not. I'm glad that we are in general, like society is talking about caring more and what that looks like, especially in a time where the world just doesn't feel very caring. It's important. The stuff that we're doing on a day-to-day basis means something and counts. So the things that we're doing for each other, for your friends, for your kids and your parents and your family. I mean, whatever it is, maybe it's just an online platform that you have and the way we show up for each other matters. So if you're doing that in any way, like you're you're that's amazing, and you should feel good about it. A lot of people our age think that they have more time to not be caring for people. And if you had talked to me three years ago, I probably if you would have asked me, Oh, are you in the sandwich generation? I probably would have said no. Even though I was and didn't recognize it, my life looked so different. From November 1st, 2023 to November 3rd, 2023, there is a before and after. I'm a just a different person and recognize how much we take for granted in life. Even though I've been in the sandwich generation longer than I realized, like that is that was my kind of before and after market. Yeah. Your watershed moment. Yeah. Yeah. Life is weird. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:38

I have a few of those moments, but I think it's for me, it's been less of those distinct moments and more of just this gradual process of of feeling like little by little I the parents who raised me are getting farther and farther away from what I remember. So I think yeah, they're both totally valid experiences, they're both really hard experiences. And if you are anywhere on that spectrum, you are welcome here and we see you.

SPEAKER_01 17:08

Yeah, what you said about your childhood ending is like that is heavy. I didn't yeah, it's I wish that weren't true. And like in some ways, I feel like an adult, but yeah being able to call my dad and like yell at him, like that was our relationship. Like it wasn't we were really close in that way. Since that has happened, so many of my family members aunts or like even my mom is like, you don't laugh as much anymore. Yeah. I'm not I'm not the same person. Like you used to be so fun, and like like you would laugh and like make light of the I'm like, oh okay, sorry. Like I don't know what to do. I think you're still fun, by the way. I feel like I am, but like or if I'll like make a joke and laugh and people will be like, oh see, that that's who you like, that's who you should be. Okay, sorry. I don't know what to tell you. You just don't know when things will affect you in ways that change your perspective on life and the way you're living your life.

SPEAKER_00 18:06

I had someone point out that I have gray hair now, and I was like, Well, you know what causes that?

SPEAKER_01 18:13

Yeah, that's true. Like you said, the way we see our careers and what's important, this totally this event in my life completely changed. And like, and I think we all, after we have kids, it's that moment when you're like, oh, perspective, like this some things don't matter, and that's yeah, pretty universal. A lot of moms I've talked to have felt that. So I'm a geriatrician, so I take care of people exclusively people 65 and older. And my dad was 65 when he died. And I cannot tell you how hard it was to show up at work and take care of people who are older than I would ever see my dad. And having the same level of empathy, and I that was my whole practice as be like I felt that what I was bringing to the table for these families was my empathy and my ability to understand their love and how and how important it is to help your parents age well and stay healthy. And I was not a good doctor that year. No one would know that. I don't think that anyone I took care of in that year would say that. I don't I don't think I I showed it, and it didn't change outwardly how I practiced, but I was not there. I found it really hard to have empathy when someone was saying, Oh, I just really want my mom to make it to her hundredth birthday. She's so close. She's 99 and just rage in my brain and not being able to express that. You don't want to show up and be like, Yeah, I don't care. It wasn't even true that I didn't care, but it was like, like, you're so lucky, and I can't be like, you know what, you're so lucky. Yeah, totally changed what mattered and how I saw my patients and their families, and it changed my practice completely. And I would say it's still kind of hard. I mean, I'm I'm definitely close to my empathy levels from before, but I'm not the same doctor. I'm not the and not the same person, not the same person. I'm never going to be that person when you're grieving and when people you can really tell when people who are close to you kind of like wait in the wings until they think you should be back to yourself. It just doesn't work that way. And yeah, that's a whole different conversation. But yeah, I'm never gonna be that person. And I'm I'm very lucky to have my mom. I'm grateful for what I do have, and this is really hard. We were talking about this recently when people are like, oh, this is just a phase of life and you're gonna miss this. Of course I am, because if I'm not in this situation, something has gone wrong, right? Like if I'm not, there's no good way out of this. No, there isn't. And I hope that it lasts years and years and years, and it's really hard. It's really hard while I'm in it. I'm not trying to wish it away, and it's really hard.

SPEAKER_00 21:00

Yeah, I mean, nuance just gets lost on the internet these days, but two things can be true, and we can be really grateful and we can we can really love taking care of people. Like I love caring for people, I've always been a nurturing person, but also it's hard, and also we can talk about our experience. And what I think we're doing a lot on this podcast is talking about our experiences, right? Like, we're not gonna talk a ton about the exact stuff that's going on in our families. We have a lot of respect for our parents' privacy and our kids' privacy, and our partners, their parents, and yeah, all of that. And then it just we don't need to share every little detail. We don't need to share every single detail. And also, this can just be about the experience of the millennials who are in the middle, or you don't have to be millennial. I'm sure there's a lot of Gen X, Gen Z people who are in the same boat, and you're obviously welcome to be be in the millennial sandwich with us. But it's kind of like when you have a baby and nobody asks you how you're doing, they just say, How's the baby? I feel Like being in the sandwich generation is a lot like that. And people are just asking you, How are your parents? How are your kids? But nobody's really asking you how you're doing. And I wouldn't even know how to answer that.

SPEAKER_01 22:10

Would if you ask me how I'm doing, I'm gonna tell you how my kids are doing and how my parents are doing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:15

Yeah. And I think that's part of it. Like everybody a few years ago with that Meghan Markle article was saying we need to start asking new moms how they're doing, but that's not enough. You also have to hold space for a range of answers, ranging from I'm doing great, I'm the happiest I've ever been, to nobody told me that I was gonna be feeling X, Y, and Z. And I think that's true of being in the sandwich generation too. It's there's a range of emotions, there's a range of experiences, there are conflicting emotions and experiences, and it's just it just, it's it's messy.

SPEAKER_01 22:49

Yeah. Do you think when people ask you, or if they did ask you, how are you doing, would you give them a real answer? I don't know. I do like the fake smile and like I'm good. What about you? Same. That's a whole conversation that's gonna drain all of my energy and time. And instead, I'll tell you on a podcast. Yeah, I I think we probably all should be better about actually answering, or at least in small ways, and expecting people to give you a a real answer. But no, right now I don't. Even then, when I was like in the height of my grief, no, I wasn't and if someone said, How are you doing? It's all right.

SPEAKER_00 23:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:35

My kids are this, my mom is this. And I would spit out a bunch of those generic lines and I would get back, like, oh, we're thinking of you, and sure, let's do the let's do that. That's fine, and we'll move on. And but I also don't think I was in the space to really answer how I was. I I still don't think I would be able to answer. I don't even know. I don't I don't know how I'm doing. I'm hoping that when the conversations that we have, I'll figure that out. I don't really know how I'm doing. I don't know. Yeah. I guess we'll see. I guess we'll see how I'm doing.

SPEAKER_00 24:06

Well, this is one of our heavier episodes, I think.

SPEAKER_01 24:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:10

We like to end with a little pop culture rapid fire, but maybe the only thing that's appropriate for this one is to just ask, Did you ever see sandwich generation representation in pop culture when we were growing up? That's a good one.

SPEAKER_01 24:26

Well, my the first thing that I didn't even really watch Everybody Loves Raymond, but that is the first thing that comes to my head. Never watched that. It was like the whole family. That's kind of when I what I think of when I think envision people in the middle of having young kids and yeah, but don't you think that a lot of TV and movies and stuff that we watched when we were younger showed more multi-generational life? More of like the villages.

SPEAKER_00 24:53

Yeah. I feel like there was a full house episode with Danny's mom where they kind of touched on it, but also the same mom and everybody loves grew up with is just like it was so episodic and it would happen on one episode and then it would just be over. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:09

Like the one where their the grandfather comes, Papuli comes, and he also dies, and then they and then it's over, and then they do that dance, and then he's never mentioned again. That's it. Nice and wrapped up. But yeah, like family matters. The grandma lived in the house, and I'm sure it was like plot convenience too for everyone to be in the house. But this actor only has one day. We gotta get it all in there. It kind of in a way worked because I do feel like my idea of what a family should obviously my own family, but for kids who grew up with immigrant parents, our families looked different than our friends' families and what was normal. And what we learned about what was normal was what we saw on TV. And that was what I thought it looked like. And it wasn't so different for me. My my grandparents lived very close to me. I grew up going to my grandparents' house every weekend, but most of my friends who are first generation Americans did not have local grandparents. So I'm sure that was, I mean, what was that like seeing not having your grandparents close by and seeing what families looked like in pop culture?

SPEAKER_00 26:24

Yeah, it was I definitely did not have the typical immigrant experience in that respect. I basically, the only family we had nearby was just me and my parents, and we had a community, which gives you a little bit of that fix, but it's also not exactly the same. My husband will always make fun of me because he found this thing I had written in elementary school where you had to write about your family. And I wrote, the Husseini family is a small, normal family. So whenever he talks about my family, he'll be like, Your small, normal family. I love it. That's really cute. Yeah, I mean, I think I was always acutely aware of the fact that I had a small family.

SPEAKER_01 27:02

Yeah, mine is the opposite in some ways. My grandparents moved to America in the 50s, but they didn't bring my mom with them. My mom was a baby. I don't know how much of this is okay to share or not. I think it's fine to say that that certainly shaped her experience with her parents. And then moving as an adult. The first time my mom lived close to her parents was as an adult married. And that obviously shaped how she parented and daughtered. A lot of there's a lot to unpack there about how she felt about not coming and how her life was different. My mom grew up in a village in India. Uh, and while while her parents lived in a sizable city, I mean, yeah, they lived in New York for a while. And there's just so much that gets passed on to how we parent. And I have to actively think about too when I see how my mom parents, like, oh, she's responding to her own hurt and feelings around her own upbringing. But sometimes it's still annoying. Like sometimes I'm still like annoyed by the way that she does things, even understanding, I get it. Like if this was someone else's mom, I'd be like, oh, you gotta give her grace because the these are the things she went through. And but it's hard. It's hard to do that. It's hard.

unknown 28:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:27

Yeah. Actually, like I've never really I've had conversations about it with my mom, but she's super resilient and has been through a lot in her life. And some of that comes from never talking about anything that happen has happened. And she's been through a lot of hard stuff. So I don't think that she has ever sat down with someone and talked about everything she's been through. Um, maybe that would have been good in a lot of ways for her and for us. And but here we are.

SPEAKER_00 28:55

Yeah. I think also just to say like our parents are amazing people, all four of them. We are really just the luckiest people to have been raised by the people who raised us. And, you know, yeah, we're gonna be talking about little idiosyncrasies that boomers have and all of that, but we are never throwing our parents under the bus. We have the most respect for them, and that's not the point of this show.

SPEAKER_01 29:17

Yeah. And we also understand that not everybody has amazing, supportive, involved parents. We uh had the extreme luck of having, and that shapes how you are showing up in the sandwich. Uh, and we're not we're never going to generalize what this experience is, and we totally understand that not everybody has the same experience being raised and raising other people.

SPEAKER_00 29:43

I've seen a lot of comments on our stuff from people saying, like, I'm taking care of my parent and I'm so resentful because my parent never took care of me or you know, things like that.

SPEAKER_01 29:52

That's that's fair, that's valid. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:56

Anyway.

SPEAKER_01 29:57

All right.

SPEAKER_00 29:58

Well, next time we'll be more fun next time, I promise. Try less.

SPEAKER_01 30:02

Yeah. All right, well, have a good day.

SPEAKER_00 30:08

Thank you for listening to the Millennial Sandwich. Don't forget to like, subscribe, give us a rating, and connect with us on social media.